She earned an Australian recall, helped Sydney to a national title and Sydney University to a grand final appearance, and made serious waves as one of the Wallaroos’ best at the 2017 Women’s Rugby World Cup in Ireland – yep, it’s fair to say Kinross product Grace Hamilton had a pretty big year.
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Then she made it even bigger, by dominating at last weekend’s Rugby Australia National Sevens Championship and inspiring her NSW side to the title.
Hamilton and her NSW side downed Queensland Red in a State of Origin-style decider, trouncing the northerners 24-5 in a grand final demolition job thanks to Hannah Southwell, Katrina Barker, Katie Harrison and Kennedy Cherrington tries.
The 25-year-old, who plays No.8 for the Wallaroos, labelled the undefeated championship win the perfect way to top the year off, adding she’s looking forward to some time off until after the new year as well.
“There’s been heaps of rugby this year, getting back into it … I think I’ll take a break until next year now,” Hamilton said.
Hamilton and her NSW side easily accounted for Tasmania (55-0) and then ACT (31-5) in the opening rounds, before scoring a hard-fought 19-5 win over the National Indigenous side.
“The Indigenous girls always come out firing,” Hamilton said.
NSW downed the Indigenous side again in the qualifying final, 22-12, then beat Queensland White 27-5 in the semi-final.
“We had not so long together [coming into the nationals], so it was great to the win,” Hamilton said, her NSW teammates Nicole Beck echoing that sentiment.
“We started off a bit slow, we were still getting to know each other because we hadn’t really trained together so it’s good to get the W,” Beck said.
Beck said it was an especially satisfying win considering the Reds were chock-a-block full of stars from the University of Queensland side that won the AON National University Sevens Series.
“It was good for NSW to show we’ve got plenty of good rugby in us as well,” Beck said.
Orange City junior Hunter Ward, a St Stanislaus College Bathurst student, also made his NSW sevens debut at the national championship, but his side was left to fight it out for the minor placings after dropping a game to Queensland Red (24-21) on day one.
Ward’s side was then beaten by Victoria in the qualifying final (17-0), before winning its last two play-off games against National Universities (27-12) and ACT (21-10).
The national titles were a big part of the selection process for Australia’s Youth Commonwealth Games and senior national sides too.
The National Youth Sevens Championship, in which Kinross’ Donny Freeman and Preston Simpson will represent NSW, kick off on December 9 at Brisbane’s Ballymore Stadium.
Matt Findlay
Formerly a sports specialist, I'm based at Orange and shift between wide-spread range of subjects here and, often, across the entire Central West region of NSW as well. I have almost a decade of experience in the media and marketing industries both here in Australia and internationally, along with journalism I have experience in content strategy, brand development, and digital and social media. Along the way, I've been fortunate to win a handful of media awards and be nominated for several others too.
Formerly a sports specialist, I'm based at Orange and shift between wide-spread range of subjects here and, often, across the entire Central West region of NSW as well. I have almost a decade of experience in the media and marketing industries both here in Australia and internationally, along with journalism I have experience in content strategy, brand development, and digital and social media. Along the way, I've been fortunate to win a handful of media awards and be nominated for several others too.
